


The Yaga

by Wittyandcharming



Category: Den lengste reisen | The Longest Journey, Dreamfall, Dreamfall Chapters
Genre: Baba Yaga - Freeform, Dreamfall Chapters - Freeform, Folklore, Gen, the longest journey - Freeform, the yaga
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-18
Updated: 2016-01-18
Packaged: 2018-05-14 19:53:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5756176
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wittyandcharming/pseuds/Wittyandcharming
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Who is the Yaga? What darkness did they dwell in before they found the Soul Stone?</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Yaga

She had not always been called the Gribbler. It was a such a silly name, the Sisters thought, but the little live things loved their silliness. Perhaps it was an attempt to make her less frightening. They knew, however, with a contemptuous satisfaction, that it did not succeed. No nonsense word in the worlds could change the cruel sharpness of the witch’s teeth, nor still that wicked, hissing tongue, and everything was equal beneath her gluttonous stare. There was no real bravery. Defiance, once in a while. Begging. Or perhaps the wild, thrashing instinct to survive. But there was still fear, always fear, and to hide it from the Sisters was impossible. It was the aromatic air they breathed, the blood that ran beneath their twilight skin, what they drank like a heady black wine until they were intoxicated by it. The one they called the Gribbler had delivered them that wine in a long-necked bottle made with her own vicious nature. But she was gone now. Gone in the fire where she had seared so many bones, and their mouths and tongues and throats were arid and cracked in its absence.

And what did they have left then, now that the wizard had been taken, too? Where was that fear, so fragrant and flavorful, that coursed through their ancient veins in a thousand terrible rivers? Gone. Banished by one, insignificant burst of light in all the weak flickering of humankind. Who was that awful, bright soul that wished them so diminished? She had cut them off. Fear existed still, swam in every forest, down every street, and in an endless circle around every heart. But none of it was for them. Not anymore. It was given over now to loved ones when they left home, to the safety of children as they played outside, to ailing dogs as they aged, and it made the Sisters sick that they should fall so low that even dogs were being given more than they. Even nightmares had failed them when they began to feature other monsters who pushed them so far back into their own darkness they disappeared.

Baeb didn’t understand how it had happened, what she had done wrong, and the sharpness of her eternal youth dulled, a blunted knife that still tried fruitlessly to cut. Ayae, furious and fierce and always strong, could not find the spark enough to be angry at this light that wasted them, and her fire shrank as the place in-between grew colder. And Gh’aa, ancient and imposing, great proud horns on her aged brow, became both more and less. Less wise, less fearsome, less solid, but infinitely more tired, more decayed, and her flesh sagged evermore on her bones, as though her own skin would drag her down into nothingness.

But they had their garden of souls at least, the bodiless blue vapors of a dozen snuffed candles hovering above the swamp waters as long as the Sisters wished to keep them. They would keep them forever, it seemed to them now, or as close to what forever meant to them anymore. But they knew it was fruitless. They knew that they only prolonged what would come. In another era, Ayae would have railed against these foolish little creatures, hating them, asking how it was possible not to know how much they were needed. Didn’t they understand? They spoke of the Balance unceasingly, used its name as both a blessing and a curse, letting it fall from their mouths as stones spill mindlessly down the side of a mountain, but true balance was not what they wanted. They spoke of the Balance, but cared nothing for it. They didn’t care about the darkness so necessary to keeping their light. They would have nothing but that painful brightness and see the worlds and all of creation tilt like an overburdened scale until all crashed to the ground and turned to ash upon the black fire that burned there. Ayae could rail against nothing now. She could only nurse her bitterness with the memories of what it had felt like once, while she watched her Sisters, watched all facets of herself, fade away.

The Wizard had once had something, they recalled. The Wizard had once had a crystal haunted with souls, a prison for them, a cask full of that sweet black wine they loved so much. The Bright One had shattered it and spilled it all across the floor, careless, wasteful, cruel. Oh, what it would have felt like to hold it to their chest! To feel the warmth of those many terrified lives coursing through the smooth violet stone, to have the taste of it on their tongues again. It could be theirs, Baeb whispered. It could belong to them, if they could but retrieve it. Perhaps, Ayae had answered, they had strength enough left. Perhaps they could find it, repair it, fill it again, and keep it as long as they could. They had been a Goddess once. They had been loved and feared and spoken of to trembling children as they lay in their beds. Perhaps there was enough of a Goddess left in them for this, Gh’aa had murmured, a last desperate act, one final journey to find their salvation, into the place that used to know them well, and had forgotten them like a dream.


End file.
